Inner City Fly Fishing

By Ellis P. Mendiola

Fourteen months ago I was diagnosed with congestive
heart failure and spent two months at home recuperating.
Due to the high heat in our area, one of my doctors
recommended that I not do any fishing for a year.
It was during this time that I again took up flytying
seriously. Along with rod building, tying would be
good way to keep myself occupied. It was during this
time that I also started viewing Fly Anglers OnLine
and enjoying the many articles written on the subject
of fly-fishing.

The article by Ed Mercado on finding places
to fish in the city really hit home. For the
past year, I too have discovered that there are
many places to fish near one's home if time is
taken to do a little search. I found a pond five
minutes from home that was left after some freeway
construction a few years back. I started going to
that pond to do some practice casting and to see
how my new flies would appear in the water. Lo
and behold, there were many bream and small bass
in that pond. Since then it has become a favorite
spot for my fly-fishing nephew and I. His biggest
bass so far has been a two pounder that he caught
on one of my Clouser minnows. To boot, it was
Chris' first bass on a fly.

My nephew Chris and I decided that maybe we
could find other places nearby to fly-fish.
A trip to a local fly shop put on some carp
fishing areas. A video was shown to us on carp
fishing in the city. We bought some hooks and
coffee beans, tied some flies and Chris has been
carp fishing in a small bayou that runs by his
apartment. I have not tried carp fishing yet but
it is on my lists of things to do this coming year.

There are so many places to fish that I was not
aware of and I overlooked them in the past. This
is the time of year that our State Parks department
stocks rainbow trout in our public parks. All one
needs is a fishing license and a trout stamp to fish
these areas...and you can keep some of the fish for
consumption. I saw an old man fishing a drainage
ditch on my way to our city lake. I stopped and
chatted awhile and he told me that he catches
crappie out of those ditches. This is yet another
place to do some fly-fishing. Up the road from the
freeway pond I found another hole to fish. So the
list goes on and on.

My thanks again to Ed Mercado for his article...the
fishing can be right here at home.